Bury the Hatchet in Dead Mule Swamp by Joan H. Young Read Free Book Online Page B

of
information,” she boasted.
    Chad glanced my way and
smirked. “I’m an outsider, for sure, but it looks to me like
someone is trying to send a big fat warning to your Jerry
Caulfield. So, who would want to see him out of the
way?”
    “Now that’s an awfully
serious question.” Adele sat a full bag of our groceries back in
the cart with a solid thump. “I’ve been thinking about that
myself.”
    “Well?”
    “Could be a lot of people.
There’s Jack Panther, of course.”
    “Jack Panther!” I
exclaimed. I had no idea the owner of the Pine Tree had bad blood
with Jerry.
    “What’s his beef?” Chad
asked.
    “Oh yes, Jack and Jerry go
back a long way. When the Cherry Blossom Restaurant closed Jack
tried to buy it. Jerry didn’t think Jack had enough class to run a
nice restaurant like that. He used his leverage with the officers
at the bank, and Jack couldn’t get a loan.”
    “What’s this Jack do now?”
Chad asked.
    “He owns the little diner
down the street,” I said.
    “But that’s nothing
compared to what the Cherry Blossom could have brought in,
right?”
    “Definitely,” Adele said.
“Jerry Caulfield is a good man, but he has a lot of influence over
what happens in this town.”
    “I wonder if Jerry is
making a mental list of people who might have something against
him,” I mused aloud.
    Chad guffawed. “Ma, by now
the police have sat him down and told him to make that list on
paper. For them.”
     

Chapter 9
     
    Chad complained about my
tiny tabletop grill, but he managed to get a nice bed of coals
going, and while I worked on shucking and boiling the corn, he
watched the steaks.
    Although it wasn’t yet
fall, sunset was coming noticeably earlier. We sat on the concrete
terrace and angled our chairs toward the swamp, to keep the low
orange sun out of our eyes. We watched the slanting light set the
tops of the trees aglow. I still didn’t have a picnic table, but
the card table served well enough for the two of us. Chad was
devouring his steak like a lumberjack. I was enjoying mine, but
this was way too much food for me; I was already planning two more
meals from this slab of meat. I’d add some vegetables and
rice...
    “Ma, I want you to think
about something,” Chad intruded on my thoughts, as he lay down his
fork. His tone was serious.
    “What?”
    “I don’t think you are
taking very good care of yourself. You don’t have a television or
an internet connection...”
    My initial reaction to this
statement wasn’t positive, and I interrupted. “I don’t miss having
electronic toys at all. When I do, I’ll get them.”
    “It’s not just that. I
don’t like the way you live out here all alone at the end of a dirt
road. You don’t have furniture in all your rooms or any curtains at
all. You hardly keep enough food in the refrigerator for your next
meal.”
    “Hold on, there! I’m not
very alone. I talk on the phone with Cora or Adele almost every
day.” Chad didn’t need to know that was a bit of a fib. And, since
when did college students worry about furniture and curtains? “I’ve
been able to fix up this house just the way I want to, and I’m
enjoying working on it a little bit at a time without your father
telling me what to do. And, do I look like I’m starving?” I patted
my hips which were neither skinny nor excessively padded for a
woman of forty-two.
    “Do you even know your
closest neighbor?”
    That made me stop and
think. I had to admit I didn’t know him very well. When I lived in
the suburbs, there had been hundreds of people living within a half
mile. Here, the closest house was two-plus miles away at Cherry Pit
Junction. An old widower, Eino Tangen, lived there alone. He had
been polite but hadn’t encouraged me to contact him again when I’d
knocked on his door in May to introduce myself.
    Chad continued. “I’ll bet
you don’t take your cell phone out with you half the
time.”
    I wasn’t willing to confess
to the truth of that crime.